Campaign drives down crime, homelessness in Escondido

Crime and homelessness are sharply down in Escondido’s Grape Day Park this winter thanks to an aggressive campaign that includes loud classical music, tree trimming, extra police patrols and policies discouraging donations.

City officials said last week that they’re surprised at the success achieved by a new task force aimed at making the 22-acre urban park safe for families and hundreds of residents moving into new downtown condominiums and apartments.

“We’ve seen some fantastic results because we have more stakeholders involved and because we’ve sharpened our focus,” said police Capt. Bob Benton, chairman of the task force. “But I’m surprised at how much success we’ve had. We only got started Oct. 18.”

Since then, 32 people have been arrested, including a sex offender and a gang leader who was selling heroin. And 50 more people have been cited for violations ranging from alcohol possession to smoking in the park.

In addition, shrubs and trees throughout the park have been trimmed to reduce the number of concealed places where people can sleep, take drugs, sell drugs or commit other crimes.

“There are still some places to hide, but we’re making progress,” Benton said.

And to avoid having the problems simply migrate to the nearby California Center for the Arts, Escondido, or the Starbucks patio in the Regal Cinemas plaza, every new policy has also been applied to those areas.

That includes playing loud classical music to make it hard for homeless people to sleep, and to make those areas seem less cool to gang members and criminals, Benton said.

Eddie Goldberg, property manager for the Regal plaza, told task force members recently that the music has reduced the number of homeless on the Starbucks patio and has led to less loitering there by members of the Juggalos gang.

Arts center officials said they will begin playing loud classical music on their campus as soon as possible.

Another key element of the campaign has been persuading local churches to stop bringing food and clothing to the park’s homeless, Benton said.

“Donations like that make Grape Day Park the place for homeless people to go,” Benton said. “And having those things available in the park discourages some people from getting the help they need from social services.”

So Benton teamed up with Laura Cardona of Interfaith Community Services to ask churches to host donation events at Interfaith or on the campus of the particular church, places where people with mental health or substance abuse problems can sign up for help.

But Benton said the centerpiece of the campaign has been police patrols, which have shifted from reactive to proactive.

Escondido police have tried to tackle problems in the park several times before, most notably in fall 2011 when the park’s bathrooms were closed for three months to discourage criminal activity.

He said bicycle officers spend most of their day in the park and that other officers have been focused much more on the area. That has added up to 200 extra patrols since mid-October.

In early December, those patrols helped police arrest a sex offender loitering at Starbucks who had allegedly leered at students from the nearby Classical Academy.

And then police arrested two drug dealers, including a Juggalos leader whom Benton said agreed to a plea deal last week that includes a full year in jail. Benton said those two arrests have helped sharply reduce drug sales in the park.

Additional elements of the campaign will include installing security cameras in the park, at the arts center, in the Regal plaza and in the nearby Maple Street Plaza, where some of the problems have spread recently, Benton said.

Police are also exploring some stricter ordinances against loitering and other problems, and Benton said the city plans to build new bathrooms in Grape Day Park to make crimes harder to commit.

In addition, the City Council recently agreed to spend $80,000 on new playground equipment for the park.

Wendy Barker, executive director of the Escondido History Center, located at the park, and a member of the task force, said adding amenities that will attract people to the park is crucial.

“This isn’t just about the homeless; it’s about paying more attention to this downtown treasure,” she said. “Right now it’s about crime prevention, but soon we’ll start talking about making sure this community gem is lively all the time and filled with people.”